Learning French in a classroom is one thing. Speaking French out there in the big wide francophone world is something else. French slang is often quite different from what you learned in your French course and even the simple vernacular idiom can be confusing. Imagine a French person coming across the English expression “raining cats and dogs” for the first time! (In French, il pleut des cordes – it’s raining ropes.)

To help you out, here are some common (and colloquial) French expressions and phrases to get you started on your linguistic journey. We will be covering both basic French words to help you navigate your trip to France and French expressions you might not have learned in your beginner French course.

French Words And Phrases To Get Around

Visiting France? Don’t want to appear impolite? Here are some of the most common words and expressions for everyday use.

“Bonjour” means “good-day” in French, but is mostly used for “Hello”. Photo on Visualhunt

Unlike in English, where you might wish someone a good morning or good afternoon, French greetings only cover the whole day. Only at the end of the day might you wish someone Bonsoir, but never in the sense of “good evening”. Bonsoir is closer to “good-night” – you say it when you leave in the evening or shortly before going to bed.

Bonne nuit is only used just before going to bed.

During the day, when leaving you will tell your French friends:

Au revoir! (literally, “till we see each other again.”)

If they are going somewhere and you want to say “have a good trip”, tell them: Bon voyage!

French Word for “Please” and “Thank-You”

Of course, any French for Beginners class will include basic French phrases for “please” and “thank you”, but in the spirit of thoroughness, here they are again:

English word

French translation
(formal)

French translation
(informal)

Please

S'il-vous plaît.

S'il te plaît.

Thank you

Merci

Merci

Thank you very much

Merci beaucoup

Merci beaucoup

Excuse-me

Pardonnez-moi
Excusez-moi

Pardon

When meeting the French, you should address them in the following way:

Gender

English word

French word

masculine

Sir, Mr.

monsieur

feminine (married)

Mrs., Ma'am

madame

feminine (unmarried)

Miss

mademoiselle

Parlez-vous Francais?

In your first French lessons, you often learn the phrase: “Do you speak French?”

“Avez-vous une carte anglaise plutôt que française?”
Can I have the English rather than the French menu?

And here’s a French to English table of common French question words:

English designation

French designation

Who?

Qui?

What?

Que?

How much?

Combien?

Where?

Où?

How far?

À quelle distance?

Quand?

When?

About French words for understanding directions and time

Of course, it helps if you can understand the answer to your question (which you will, of course, have asked with impeccable French pronunciation).

Here is a list of words used in directions:

English

French

left

gauche

right

droite

straight ahead

tout droit

turn

tournez

bus stop

arrêt de bus

Underground

métro

Remember when you speak French that the French don’t use AM and PM – they’re on twenty-four hour time, so expect to hear “dix-sept heures” for five o’clock in the afternoon.

Un quart d’heure = a quarter of an hour

Une demi heure = half an hour

“Mardi Gras”, the big carneval festival, means “fat tuesday” – the last day before the fast period of Lent, the last day in which you can eat fatty foods. Photo credit: JAM Project on VisualHunt

In case you need to make appointments, here is a list with the name of the days of the week in French. And because we want you to learn more about French culture, we’ll give you their etymology. Unlike the English language, where the words of the week come from Germanic Anglo-Saxon, the French weekdays are based on Latin designations + the word Dies (French, like Portuguese, is a Romance language derived mostly from vernacular Latin, though it was heavily influenced by Frankish, a Germanic language spoken by the first kings of France).

Lundi (same as in english: Moon-day, Luna-dies)

Mardi (the day of Mars)

Mercredi (the day of Mercury)

Jeudi (the day of Juno)

Vendredi (the day of Venus)

Samedi (Sambati dies, name of the day of the Judaic Sabbath)

Dimanche (Dominicus, the Christian Sabbath day)

You can hear them pronounced here. Did you pay attention? There will be a quiz! (By the way, language games and quizzes are a great way to learn French!)

Conversational French Words and Phrases They Didn’t Teach You in French Class

Whether you are planning to travel in France or have already been living in France for some time, (or simply regularly watch French films to improve your command of the language) you are sure to stumble over French idioms. You know – those expressions in which you know every word from your French vocabulary lessons, but still don’t understand the meaning of the phrase.

Here you will learn how to speak French like a native rather than a textbook.

Words and phrases English speakers need to know

Here are some words that you will encounter in spoken French – or when watching or reading the French news – but that are hard to find translations for. In other words, your French English or French French dictionaries might tell you the meaning of these common words (and their descent from Indo European), but not their usage:

Du coup
These common words come at the the beginning of a sentence and denotes an effect. Can sometimes also be used like the English “in short”.

This short exchange means: “All right?” “As usual!” (Comme d’hab is short for “comme d’habitude”, in French slang.)

Ça te dit?

When you speak French, you ask Ça te dit? (does it talk to you?) to see if another person is pleased with doing something.

On va au resto. Ça te dit?
We’re off to the restaurant. Do you feel like it?

N’importe quoi
Although it means “whatever, anything at all”, “n’importe quoi” is best translated in English as “rubbish”:

Mais il dit n’importe quoi!
He’s talking rubbish.

Though you can also “do rubbish” in France:

Il fait n’importe quoi! means he’s either not doing a job correctly or is doddering about and accomplishing nothing. If someone is spelling French words like they are pronounced, il fait n’importe quoi.

French phrases denoting frustration

Here are some idiomatic expressions in French you might hear from annoyed people:

If a French speaker says Ça me gonfle, it can be translated as “I am so tired of this”. It can be used for anything that really annoys you. It’s quite familiar and is the equivalent of ça m’énerve. For example, when the cat constantly knocks over your careful piles of flashcards explaining French grammar. Synonyms to these French idioms are ras-le-bol/la cafetière (the bowl/coffee pot is full – and soon to overflow) and j’en ais marre.

“Ras-le-bol” means that you are “up to here” with somethings – your bowl of patience is full and about to overflow. Photo credit: Vermin Inc on Visualhunt

Avoir le cafard, “to have the cockroach” translates in English to “feeling blue”. This expression was supposedly first used in French poet Baudelaire’s book Les fleurs du mal and is derived from poor living conditions infested with vermin, which is depressing. You can “have a cockroach” from realising that your French pronunciation hasn’t improved, you always use the wrong pronoun and you still don’t know where to put the adverb.

Avoir la moutarde qui lui monte au nez, “to have mustard rise into your nose” means to get progressively more angry. Like that feeling when you get mustard up your nose. Or when learning the conjugation of French verbs or trying to decipher French accents from the south of France.

Someone in this state of mind might respond to your enquiries with:
“Mêle-toi de tes oignons!”, “take care of your (own) onions!” – mind your own business. The inhabitants of previously colonized countries probably wished France had taken care of their onions and left them alone instead of imposing French culture on them.

After trying to find the right words in French to express what you mean for ten minutes straight, you might say: “Laisse tomber”, “let it fall” – “forget about it, let it go.”

If French speakers say “Revenons à nos moutons” “let’s come back to our sheep”, they’re not talking about a walk in the countryside – just that you should get back on topic after straying on a fascinating tangent about the Indo-European languages, the French Revolution or where you can find the best French clothing.

A few amusing phrases in the French language

Beginner French courses may not cover these, but we will! Here are some nice cases of knowing all the words, but not necessarily the meaning. So here are idioms in the French language to improve your vocabulary:

À la Saint Glin-glin. The Catholic calendar has feast days for all its saints – but none are called Glinglin. If something is due to happen à la Saint-Glinglin, it never will.

Les mouettes ont pied “the seagulls can stand” (”avoir pied” in a body of water means you can stand in it with your head above the water). This is a charming way of saying in French that your glass is empty and someone should refill it.

When the gulls can stand in it, your glass is not full enough – a pithy French idionm. Photo credit: ~Pawsitive~Candie_N on Visualhunt

J’en mettrais ma main au feu!
One translation could be “I would swear to it in court”. It is referring to either the story of Gaius Mucius Scaevola, who put his hand in the fire to show his bravery and determination or to a medieval practice of divine judgment in which a glowing rod was thrust into the defendant’s hand. These words are only if you are 100% sure of something.

Eager to learn French the way it is spoken in France, learn grammar, practise how to pronounce it properly and know which words are idiomatic and which aren’t? One of the best ways to learn the French language is with a private tutor – so why not give our Superprof tutors a chance?

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Sonia

Sonia is an Egyptologist turned writer and translator. She speaks 3 and a half languages, can translate hieroglyphs and enjoys yoga, singing, embroidery and travelling through all of time and space.